"Why?"
"I don't know. They smelled bad, but it was more than that. There was something about them that made my antennae lie flat against my ears. Anyway—I did a foolish thing." The cubicle turned a pale embarrassed lavender.
"What did you do?" I demanded.
"I ran away," Ven said. "And I made a lot of noise."
"All right—all right," I said impatiently. "Go ahead and tell the rest of it."
"By the time I stopped running I was down at the bottom of the hill," Ven said. "I was dead tired—and with all that rock to climb to get back to the ship. I didn't really think I'd make it."
"But you did," I said proudly. "You're a real Thalassan—pure green."
The cubicle slowly brightened again.
"Can you find them again?" I asked.
"Of course. I wasn't lost at any time. If I hadn't panicked, I'd have been back a whole lot sooner."